Virtual Environments: Is one life enough?

We got off to a good start this semester with a good show of students who all arrived well prepared. All had voice activated and were able to get their avatars sitting down ready to pay attention to the class content. This is not always an easy task and it demonstrated that participants had signed up for SL at least a few days before the class and had spent some time getting to know the basics – always a good sign of genuine interest and engagement. I also noted that participants were happy to use voice and IM to communicate and ask useful questions.

We quickly ensured that everyone had been added to each others friends lists, and that all joined the TU Dublin group so that we could keep in contact. There is some interest in upgrading from the basic avatars and students would like to customise them. We will return to that in the next class.

We were joined for some of the class by Barbara Collazo, a photographer, who was commissioned by The Avatar Scholar to record some images for the forthcoming issue which features an article I have written. We all went out to the deck to provide some variety for the photographs and to give us all a chance to stretch our legs (not that avatars get tired or stiff from sitting for long periods but, the people behind the avatars need to be stimulated by something different or there is a tendency to drift off and lose focus).

I explained the structure of our VLA, Brightspace, to the class and asked paticipants to spend some time reviewing the content – particularly the section for today’s and also the section on Assessment. It is important to be familiar with the assessment requirements because the work is spread evenly throughout the semester to ensure there is not too much pressure on students at the end of the semester, when all their other modules will require submission of work. I also reminded them that the schedule/timetable is available in the Introduction section and it is important to note that for reference. We will also welcome guest speakers joining to share their expertise on a range of topics and will go on site visits with some of them to see other places in Second Life.

Then we made a brief visit to the campus of Çağ (pronounced ’Chá‘ in English) University where we will meet students from this Turkish university during the semester. We will also meet here for some of the talks by guest speakers. Following that we went to the VWEC Eduverse plaza where many of the academic institutions that have a presence in Second Life meet to share experiences and knowledge. There are many interesting events held in the plaza with a schedule giving the full listing. I particularly recommended the Expert Talks series on Friday evenings at 9:00 pm Irish Time.

Concluding, I gave the class their assignment to be completed before the next class: Explore Second Life with some colleagues from the class. Visit at least 3 different locations. Find them in ‘Search’, or ask other residents for recommendations, or simply select places at random. Participants were also asked to review the section in the Brightspace VLE on Class 2: Team Project – Virtually Sustainable?